Robert Channing Wheeler, MD, age 93, of Greenwich, Connecticut, died at StoneRidge Retirement Community in Mystic, Connecticut March 30, 2013.
Dr. Wheeler was born in Waterbury, Connecticut. He is a graduate of The Taft School, Princeton University and Columbia College of Physicians and Surgeons. Dr. Wheeler received postgraduate education at Bellevue Hospital; Yale Child Study Center; Children's Hospital, Chicago; and Babies Hospital, New York. A Clinical Professor of Pediatrics, he taught at Columbia for thirty years. Dr. Wheeler practiced pediatrics in Greenwich for twenty years, and was on the staff of the Emergency Department of Greenwich Hospital for fifteen years.
As a volunteer physician for Care-Medico, Dr. Wheeler reopened the Pediatric Service in the war-damaged hospital Beni Massous, Algiers in 1962, and taught Emergency Medicine in Java, Indonesia in 1975.
Dr. Wheeler was a veteran of World War II. As a Lieutenant in the Navy he participated in the early studies of tuberculosis treated with streptomycin.
His marriage to Mary Whitmire of Atlanta ended in divorce. Their living children are Susan Foot of Brunswick, MD and R. Channing Wheeler of Westport, CT. Two children, Gail Brewster and Martha Wheeler predeceased him. He is also survived by five grandchildren and four great grandchildren.
Dr. Wheeler was a member of the Sons of the American Revolution, the Princeton Club of New York, a long time member of the Indian Harbor Yacht Club, the Overseas Yacht Club of New York and the Pine Orchard Yacht Club.
A celebration of his life will be held at a reception for friends and family at StoneRidge Retirement Community.
A private family burial service will be held this summer in Truro, Massachusetts.
Contributions in Dr. Wheeler's memory may be made to The Truro Conservation Trust, Post Office Box 327, North Truro, MA 02652.
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